My article in this month’s InDepth Magazine on Thailand’s Sacred Tattoos with images by Aroon Thaewchatturat, co-author and photographer of Sacred Skin – Thailand’s Spirit Tattoos, the first English language book to look at Sak Yant. On a sultry Monday morning, Ajarn Neng Onnut’s studio, known locally as a samnak, which sits tucked away in […]

Here’s an account of my visit to Sittwe, home of many Rohingya, in August 2012. This is not a particularly hands-on story, nor did it involve any courage on my part. Better reportages on the same subject have surfaced in the media in recent days. But as Sittwe is now sealed off and as no […]

A real pleasure for myself and Hans Kemp to meet Vithaya Pansringarm, the actor who played Father Ananda in Mindfulness and Murder, published byCrime Wave Press, at the Bangkok premiere of Lupin III. And Khun Vithaya is keen to do another Father Ananda movie. About the novel by Nick Wilgus: When a homeless boy living […]

Sacred Skin – Thailand’s Spirit Tattoos, photographed by Aroon Thaewchatturat, gets a couple new plugs/ reviews. The Apsara Diaries write “The book ‘Scared Skin’ focuses on Thai devotees and the Wai Khru; a once a year gathering of tattooed devotes. The book gives you a clear, in-depth understanding of Yantra and its magic.” Over at […]

My fiction imprint, Crime Wave Press, is extremely proud to be publishing Mindfulness and Murder, by American author Nick Wilgus, the first in the Father Ananda murder-mystery series and recently made into a feature film in Thailand. The Story: When a homeless boy living at the youth shelter run by a Buddhist monastery turns up […]

I just found a seven year old feature of mine called Seven Years out of Tibet, the story of Tibetan refugees stranded in Nepal, published by Asiatimes Online in January 2004. For this story, we visited the Tibetan Buddhist shrine at Bodhnath and interviewed monks who had walked from Tibet to Nepal to find themselves […]

Every year in March, thousands of Buddhist devotees gather at a temple an hour west of Bangkok to worship and celebrate one of Thailand’s strangest cults: At Wat Bang Phra, Buddhist monks use long needles to tattoo magic images and prayers on the believers’ skin. The tattoos are believed to give the wearer protection, especially […]

Austrian painter and fellow chronicler of the world Willy Wysoudil writes about his 15 minute video clip from the Nubra Valley in Ladakh: “In the village of Diskit an archery competition is held for two days in July each year. Teams from several villages shoot bows and arrows at stationary targets before retiring to song and […]